


The Coyote

by Bolt_DMC



Series: The Bolt Chronicles [26]
Category: Bolt (2008)
Genre: F/M, Humor, Literature, Movie Reference, Music, Original Character(s), Peril, Post-Canon, Puns & Word Play, Running, Suggestive Themes
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-08-29
Updated: 2020-08-29
Packaged: 2021-03-06 14:54:16
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,465
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26160694
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Bolt_DMC/pseuds/Bolt_DMC
Summary: Mittens has noticed something amiss outside the farmhouse lately. It makes her nervous, so Bolt decides to investigate -- and he stumbles onto an unwelcome visitor. How will he handle this, and will there be ramifications down the road? Primary cultural references include the movies "Zootopia" and "Apocalypse Now," Wile E. Coyote and the Roadrunner cartoons, the TV show "Columbo," the Peter Schickele "biography" of P.D.Q. Bach, author Franz Kafka, and the folk standard "Big Rock Candy Mountain" as well as music by Franz Joseph Haydn, Joni Mitchell, The Rolling Stones, The Who, Ike and Tina Turner, and Fleetwood Mac. Fair warning: expect some pun usage along the way, a fact I'm not "Haydn."
Relationships: Bolt & Mittens (Disney), Bolt/Mittens (Disney: Bolt)
Series: The Bolt Chronicles [26]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/2041639
Comments: 21
Kudos: 13





	The Coyote

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Kannik](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Kannik/gifts).



> Timeline: July 2016
> 
> For Kannik

1.

Bolt poked his head into the study and grinned when he saw Mittens lolling on her back, absentmindedly licking a paw as she raptly listened to her latest musical distraction. While not as well versed as the cat in some music genres, he was able to take an initial clue from the large CD box set of symphonies by Franz Joseph Haydn that lay next to her. It turned out that the dog didn’t need to be Columbo to figure out that Mittens was listening to the Classical Period master’s Symphony No. 104 (“London”), as he was familiar with this particular piece -- enough so that he knew it was nearly over.

“Hey, babe!” said Bolt cheerfully as the last chords of the work triumphantly sounded. “I kinda wondered where you’d been… ” (he paused for emphasis) “…‘Haydn’ this morning. Hope you don’t mind if I ‘horn’ in on your quiet time.”

Mittens stopped washing her paw, draped it across her face, and groaned. “Sweetie, y’know how I once told you that the streets prepared me to live with regrets?” She uncovered one eye and fixed the pooch with a jovially reproachful look. “Well, I’m living with one of them now for teaching you about puns. Though it was either that or having to explain every second joke when we were reading that book ‘The Definitive Biography of P.D.Q. Bach’. You’ve really gotta ‘scale’ back on this stuff in a ‘major’ way, ‘cause it’s definitely not your ‘forte’.”

The little shepherd chuckled and padded into the room to join her. “Oooh -- are you saying my puns fell ‘flat’? I’ll take ‘note’ of your ‘sharp’ criticism and try to raise the ‘bar’ next time.” He theatrically raised a paw to his brow and whined playfully. “But your words have struck a ‘chord’, and I’d be a ‘lyre’ if I said they hadn’t left me feeling ‘downbeat’. Just can’t ‘Handel’ it.”

“Ugh -- fine,” conceded Mittens with an air of long-suffering. “I take it all ‘Bach’ as a ‘cymbal’ of goodwill in the interests of maintaining domestic ‘harmony’.”

“Apology accepted!” Bolt said with a goofy smile on his face. “And though I wasn’t trying to ‘drum’ up sympathy -- and I hate to ‘harp’ on such a ‘minor’ point -- it sure was a ‘viol’ thing to say.”

The cat rolled over and blinked mutely at him.

“All punned out?” asked the dog innocently.

“No,” admitted Mittens. “But as much as I enjoy a good play on words now and then, pun wars are about as much fun as climbing Mount Denali in high heels. Let’s just bid the whole idea a hearty goodbye for now, shall we?” She wrinkled her muzzle with mock irritation. “So, Wags -- did you have anything on your pea-brain besides cruel and unusual feline mental torture?”

“Nah -- nothing important,” said Bolt. “Looks like a nice day -- didn’t know if maybe you felt like a stroll before it gets too warm out there. You’ve been talking about getting more exercise lately, and I thought this might be a good day to start.”

A worried look crossed the cat’s face. “Actually, I’d take you up on that idea, but -- well, I dunno… I’ve been noticing some kind of unusual odor up on the porch the last few days. It’s not a possum or a rabbit or a raccoon, either. I’d recognize those. It’s something weird, and more than a little unsettling. Surprised you haven’t been aware of it, really.”

“You know,” the dog mused. “Now that you mention it, I have noticed something odd out there recently. I just figured it might be a wayward skunk or something. But I agree -- I don’t want you coming to any harm. Maybe it’s a good idea for me to go investigate. Do a little sleuthing, see if there are any intruders lurking around.”

“Lemme know what you find, cuddlebear,” Mittens said anxiously. “If it’s nothing, we’ll head out for a stretch. Gettin’ myself toned up somewhere within shouting distance of flabby would be nice.”

2.

Bolt looked out the doggy door and immediately noticed something was awry. Somehow, he had the disquieting feeling that he was being watched. The shepherd audibly snuffled the air and frowned. “There it is again,” he mumbled under his breath. “It’s a funny odor, too -- kinda sharp, a little like a dog, but not quite. Can’t say I’ve ever smelled anything like it. Not too many pooches around here, so it’s definitely not that.”

The little shepherd put his snout to the ground and began to track in earnest. “Hmmm. The trail stops here -- no, no, wait -- I’ve got it over here now. And now… nothing.” He nosed around further. “Got something down this way again. Whatever it is jumped to the other side of the sprinkler, trying to confuse things. Seems like one wily critter, whatever it is.”

A series of halting trial-and-error attempts led Bolt over to the barn. “Wow -- it’s strong now!” he exclaimed, head riveted to the ground. “Really potent in this area. Must have only come by a minute ago, maybe less. Who knows? I might just unexpectedly… ”

As the pooch turned the corner at the back of the barn, he came face-to-face with the source of the mysterious smell. Gray and red matted fur covered the creature’s emaciated frame, and the top of its right ear was missing. It was like looking at a smaller, darker, and mangier version of himself. Bolt had seen pictures of coyotes before, but had never actually encountered one in person. He also knew an animal like this posed a grave danger to Mittens if she had unwisely decided to wander outside alone.

“Whaddya think you’re doing here?” the dog shouted as his adversary cowered in fear. “I thought something was amiss lately. If you think you’re gonna become a permanent fixture in our yard, you’re sadly mistaken. Go on -- out! Unless you want me to rip you to shreds and use you for lawn fertilizer.”

“Please, kind sir,” whined the coyote. “I -- I meant no harm. I only got here today and was just… er… just passing through… ”

“A likely story,” growled Bolt. “You’ve been hanging around for several days, haven’t you? Lookit, Charlie -- I’m onto you like a hungry flea circus. Guess it’s true what they say -- the way you know a coyote’s lying is that his mouth is moving!”

A startled look crossed the critter’s face. “Hey -- how’d you know my name’s Charlie?” he asked.

Bolt spluttered in frustration. “Wait, wait -- what? No! No! It’s just an expression. Don’t you dare try to distract me, got it? You guys all come complete with a loaded bag of tricks. Everybody knows that!”

Charlie backed away slowly from the angry shepherd. “You’re right about one thing. I’ve actually been here for the last several days. Seemed like a good place to find rabbits and woodchucks for supper, but your cupboard is bare.”

“So, if there’s nothing running around the yard, why are you still here?” asked the dog as a wry grin crossed his face. “Rabbits -- you said you eat them, correct?”

“I do,” said the coyote.

“And woodchucks,” added the little shepherd. “They’re on your menu too?”

Charlie nodded. “For sure.”

“How about roadrunners?” the pooch asked.

The stranger frowned. “Seriously? That’s bottom-of-the-barrel stuff. One of my uncles ate one once when he was desperate -- said it was too gamy, nothing resembling the acme of food experiences. Told me it took forever to catch the darned thing, too.”

Bolt’s expression turned menacing. “And cats. You also eat those, am I right?”

The coyote paused as he looked at the ground. “Um, well -- well, I… ”

“I knew it!” yelled the pooch. “I knew it! You saw Mittens in the window and hoped she’d venture out alone. Don’t try to deny it. That’s why I can smell you up on the porch. You’ve been spying on her through the window, you little sneak!”

“I’m really amazed,” said Charlie. “Why do you care so much about a scrawny old cat?”

“That is none of your beeswax!” snarled the dog. “All you need to know is that she’s not gonna end up as your personal blue-plate special entrée.”

The coyote gave Bolt a knowing look. “Ohhh, now I see. You’re fattening her up, saving the choice kitty bits all for yourself.”

“Will you puh-leeze drop the subject already,” blustered the shepherd. “I guarantee you, nobody’s gonna taste her choice kitty bits but me. Mittens is MINE, darn it! MINE!”

Charlie blinked incredulously. “Um, hang on a sec. Are we even talking about the same thing anymore? You’re actually saying you have feelings for… a cat?”

The pooch’s eyes widened as he shifted uncomfortably. “That’s enough! You’re getting me all discombobulated -- I can’t even think straight! Look, none of this matters, okay? You just get your shabby carcass outta here and leave my cat alone!”

“Okay, okay, okay,” barked Charlie. “You don’t have to paint me a picture.” He paused and looked Bolt squarely in the face. “Look -- I’ll make it easy for you. If there’s any way -- any way at all you can spare me a mouthful of food and a sip of water, I’ll be on my merry way. Anything will do. Honest.”

The shepherd looked askance at his fellow canid. “You swear?” he said peevishly.

Charlie’s face perked up a little. “Yeah. Yeah, I promise. Besides, I’d have to be crazy to stick around here given what I know now. You’re much bigger and stronger than I am. Gotta find someplace with lots of easy prey if I’m gonna bulk up to your level.”

“Well… okay then,” grumbled Bolt. He stopped to think briefly, then continued. “Tell you what -- I’ll be a generous sort and take a chance that you’ve got a better nature I can appeal to. Something deep down in your heart you’re not showing me. The pickings are pretty slim around here for a guy like you. If it were me, I’d take Horace Greeley’s advice and go west, young pup, go west. Over that way, where the sun sets. There are a couple of state wildlife preserves a few days journey from here, and if you keep going a while longer, there’s a national park and a couple of national forests. When you cross the river and see the mountains looming in the distance, you’ve practically arrived. You know that old song ‘Big Rock Candy Mountain’, by any chance?”

A wistful smile passed across the coyote’s face. “Matter of fact, I do. My mom used to sing it to me when I was a pup and couldn’t get to sleep. Seems like ages ago now.”

“Yeah, whatever. You need to find a place that’s a better fit, like in the song. An ideal spot -- someplace that seems like magic, just tailor-made for you.” Bolt sat down, relaxing his scowl slightly. “Anyway, there’s a duck pond the next farm over if you need a drink. And Penny’s mom just tossed some leftover spaghetti in the trashcan. I was gonna, you know, do a little perimeter patrolling off in that direction. Sometimes I get a little clumsy, though. I’ve, uh, been known to knock over those garbage cans, spill stuff all over the place once in a while. Maybe in a few minutes, you might wanna take a wander over there, if you know what I mean. But you better hightail it out of here after that. I absolutely don’t want to see your face around here ever again. Do we understand each other?”

Charlie nodded. “Bless you, kind sir. I, um, I get your drift. After I stuff my stomach, I’ll be nothing more to you than a bad memory. Guaranteed.”

3.

Several hours later, Bolt was off on his daily conditioning run. Unlike Penny, he was not the fortunate owner of an iPod, so he thought of energetic tunes he knew, the better to engage his mind and spur his pace. He had carried “Sympathy for the Devil” by The Rolling Stones, “Going Mobile” by The Who, and “River Deep -- Mountain High” by Ike and Tina Turner around with him for a significant stretch and was now understandably nursing the tune “Coyote” by Joni Mitchell in his ear.

As he ran, the shepherd’s thoughts meandered a bit with the music in his head before settling on the trashcan way back at the farmhouse. “Boy, that critter must’ve really been hungry,” Bolt said to himself. “That overturned garbage can was pretty much cleaned out when I checked it.” There was no question in his mind that the coyote was gone. In fact, Charlie’s odor had faded so much that he had obviously departed long before the pooch left the house. “Fine by me,” he muttered.

The little shepherd glanced around him, interrupting his runner’s high just enough to see where he was. To his dismay, Bolt was in an area he didn’t recognize. “Huh,” he fretted. “Maybe I should consider turning around. I don’t want to wear myself out so badly that I can’t get back to the farmhouse. There’s an intersection just ahead. Let’s take that one and do a U-turn when I find a parallel road leading home.”

He veered right, but unfortunately, no intersecting road materialized. The dog nervously picked up his pace, conjuring up the Fleetwood Mac selection “Go Your Own Way” as a running incentive. The song’s nervously stumbling verse, however, didn’t help Bolt’s agitation in the least.

“C’mon, already! There’s gotta be a crossroad coming up sometime. Where is it already?” he yelped, pushing himself closer to his limit.

On and on he ran, anxiety slowly beginning to creep into his brain and cloud his thoughts. This seemed like a highway to nowhere, pulling him into an oblivious nothingness from which he feared he might never escape. Endless asphalt, endless fences of barbed wire and metal posts, endless fields of carrots and beets and radishes -- Bolt saw nothing to suggest he was on the right path.

By now, the shepherd had reached a state of full-blown panic. The road seemed to stretch forever, like a nightmare straight out of a Franz Kafka story. The more he ran, the less he seemed to be getting anywhere. The pooch galloped on blindly, hoping for something, anything to vary what he could see, hear, or smell. The exhausted dog approached a break in the fence, turning his head to see if it might be a road, when he lost his balance and tumbled heavily to the ground.

Bolt lay by the side of the road, whining apprehensively. When he tried to get up, he found himself unable to do so. His left shoulder was killing him, wrenched hard by his fall. Obviously, he wouldn’t be able to go anywhere for a while. Worse yet, he had the uneasy feeling once again that he was being watched. He hoped he was wrong, or that whatever was eyeing him meant no harm. The little shepherd knew he was helpless and fully vulnerable to danger.

The dog saw out of the corner of his eye that the break in the fence allowed egress to a driveway and farmhouse further off in the distance. At this point, the injured pooch could only hope that a passing driver might stop, or that a kindly soul might see him from the farmhouse and help him. The latter wasn’t likely given its distance from the road, though.

Suddenly, Bolt heard a commotion from the direction of the farmhouse. “Hey, you!” a man hollered. “Go on -- git! Get outta here! I’ll teach you to nose around my chicken coop, you stinkin’ varmint! If I catch you, you’re gonna regret it, and how!”

A red and gray furry streak scrambled into the bushes next to where the shepherd lay sprawled out. Whatever it was, the creature was being pursued by an angry farmer wearing denim overalls and wielding a pitchfork. “Yaaaah -- get your mangy carcass off my property! You stay in that scrub brush, you miserable fleabag, hear me? And if I ever see you again, you’ll face the business end of my shotgun. I… ”

The farmer abruptly stopped when he saw the prostrate white dog. “Hey, what’sa matter, li’l fella?” he asked with concern. “You look hurt to me.” The man approached Bolt cautiously and shook his head in sympathy. “Can’t get up, can ya?” he said as the pooch whimpered in pain. He touched the little shepherd cautiously, eliciting an anguished groan. “Mmmm, that shoulder doesn’t look too good,” he added with concern. Running back to the farmhouse, he shouted, “Hey, Francine! Francine! Fetch my keys and license and light jacket. The dark blue one, okay? We gotta head to Dr. Burkitt’s office to have this injured dog looked at. He’s gonna need to have his shoulder reset, and his owners called. Meet me at the truck, pronto. We’ll go pick him up -- he’s just outside the driveway. C’mon, time’s a wastin’!”

4.

“Heh -- looks like things have been better for you,” came a voice almost in front of the pooch. Bolt tried to move so he could better see who had spoken, but found himself unable to do so. “No, no -- don’t get up. Doubt you could do so right now, anyway.”

The dog moaned. “You,” he gasped tenuously.

“In the flesh,” said the coyote, his head peeking out of the scrub brush at the side of the road.

Bolt smiled. “You must have one heck of an appetite if you’re trying to add a chicken dinner to all that spaghetti you ate over at my place.”

“Nah,” laughed Charlie. “I just kinda figured you might need a little help. Saw you lying there after you stumbled and fell. I knew that farmer would chase me out and happen onto you, hopefully would run you off to a clinic or something.” He paused. “Y’know, most members of my species woulda gone for your throat and made a fast meal of you when you’re down like that.”

“So -- why didn’t you?” asked the shepherd.

The coyote chuckled. “Funny thing. There was something you said back at your place that got to me. You remember, about appealing to my better nature and all that? Turns out I’ve actually got one. Who knew?”

“And,” said Bolt. “You couldn’t bring yourself to kill me, am I right?”

“Not in a million years,” asserted Charlie with a grin. “You could’ve done away with me when we first met, but you didn’t. Instead, you took pity on me, helped me out when I needed it most. I’ve been thinking a lot about that ever since. Returning the favor was the least I could do.”

The pooch smiled weakly. “Thanks,” he murmured. “I appreciate it.”

“You were right, too, about those parks and forests and nature preserves out to the west. Bumped into a vixen about halfway between here and where you live.” Charlie beamed with delight. “Said she’s heard it’ll be like heaven on earth when I get there -- trees loaded with squirrels, and so many rabbits underfoot you gotta try to avoid stepping on them. She said she’ll be heading off herself when her kits are big enough to travel. Looks like I’ll never go hungry there. What can I say? I just love the taste of bunny in the morning.”

Bolt smirked. “You know, if we were in Zootopia right now, that’d be considered a risqué thing to say.”

“Yup -- but only if I were a fox with a fancy Nick-name,” said the coyote with a wink.

The pooch rolled his eyes and winced. “Looks like you didn’t need to go for my neck after all. You’ll just do me in with a painful pun or two.”

A truck started up in the distance, and Bolt shifted position slightly at the sound. “Hey, I think that farmer’s gonna take me off to the vet now. Probably better scram outta here before he sees you.”

“You got that right,” agreed Charlie with a grimace. “I’m well aware of what a shotgun can do, and I’m not keen to tempt the guy to use it. There’s a good reason why I’m traveling solo nowadays. Anyway, gotta scoot.”

“Farewell, pal,” said the little shepherd. “Safe journeys and good luck.”

“You too,” the coyote replied. “Seeya.”

As Charlie trotted off down the road, Bolt heard him singing on the breeze:

In the Big Rock Candy Mountains, there’s a land that’s fair and bright,  
Where the handouts grow on bushes and you sleep out ev’ry night,  
Where the boxcars are all empty and the sun shines ev’ry day  
On the birds and the bees in the cigarette trees,  
The lemonade springs where the bluebird sings,  
In the Big Rock Candy Mountains.

**Author's Note:**

> The quoted lyrics to "Big Rock Candy Mountain" come from the earliest known version of the song, which was ruled to be in public domain many years ago.


End file.
